In that study, which I wrote about for NPR, Franz Messerli, a cardiologist at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital, plotted the per-capita chocolate consumption of 23 countries against the number of prizewinning scientists, peace-makers, and writers they’d produced. He found an improbably strong correlation between the two—with Switzerland at the top, and China at the bottom—and sent his findings to the New England Journal of Medicine. Cheekily, he suggested that the flavanols found in cocoa (as well as wine and green tea) might be responsible for boosting a nation’s collective intelligence. Of course, he noted, correlation does not prove causation: perhaps the Swiss simply celebrated the achievements of their country’s cognoscenti by breaking out the Lindt.

After reading Messerli’s paper, the British neurologists, apparently with too much time on their hands, decided to plot Nobel laureates against milk consumption.

“Chocolate is not usually consumed on its own,” they reason in the letter, “often being combined with milk either as a drink or as milk chocolate.” Using data from the UN, they, too, found that a healthy habit for 2 percent rendered a country more likely to win Nobel prizes. And instead of flavanols, they suggest the brain-boosting power of vitamin D as a possible explanation.

“So to improve your chances of winning Nobel prizes,” the authors conclude, “you should not only eat more chocolate but perhaps drink milk too: or strive for synergy with hot chocolate?”

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